MOOT (“to debate, to argue, to discuss, to dispute”) explores the potential role that artists, curators, educators and arts managers play in raising awareness of environmental issues and our ecology. Their next talk is this coming Wednesday 20th May. A little piece of Future Proof trivia is that the seeds of our organisation were sown during a previous MOOT talk in late 2007. Around that time the transition town movement was just getting started around the world and it was at this talk that we heard of it for the first time during Davie Philips presentation. So now you know. More on this weeks talk below the fold.

MOOT VI, Kilkenny County Council Arts Office, no. 72 John Street

Wednesday May 20 2009

Doors open at 7.45pm Starting at 8pm, Admission Free

MOOT VI is the second in the sixth series on art and the environment,  investigating ecology and sustainable arts practice more specifically, and the potential role that artists, curators, educators and arts managers play in raising awareness of environmental issues and our ecology. This discussion, like previous events, will be an open format event where artists, curators, academics etc. and the general public will be invited to question how arts and culture can contribute to addressing environmental and ecological concerns. Obviously the range of environmental concerns facing us at present are vast, but this MOOT will focus on art, ecology and sustainable ways of living and working.

This panel discussion will take place on Wednesday, May 20th in Kilkenny County Council Arts Office, no. 72 John Street at 8pm and will consist of:

Pat Cooke (IRL) Director of Cultural Policy and Arts Management at UCD Dublin
Paul O’ Brien (IRL) Lecturer in aesthetics/ cultural theory in the Faculty of Visual Arts, NCAD Dublin
Rick Faulkner and Christine Keogh (UK) Chrysalis Arts, an artist-led public art company, training and arts development agency
Heather Peak (UK) an artist based in Wales who works collaboratively with Ivan Morrison. Together, they investigate their environmental surroundings through their art, and are currently installing work as part of Radical Nature: Art and Architecture for a Changing Planet 1969–2009 at the Barbican, London

Pat Cooke

Pat Cooke worked for Ireland’s state heritage service for over twenty years, where he was director of both Kilmainham Gaol and the Pearse Museum. He took over as Director of the MA in Cultural Policy and Arts Management at UCD in 2006. As a heritage sector manager, Cooke pioneered the use of museums and historic properties in Ireland as sites for major art projects. His experience in the heritage field includes producing cultural and historical exhibitions and audio-visual presentations, and the management of historic sites in line with best principles of conservation practice. Between 2002-2006 he was Chairman of the Irish Museums Association, and chaired a Heritage Council committee charged with developing an accreditation programme for Irish museums. Currently he is an assessor on the implementation of that programme. http://www.ucd.ie/arthistory/postgraduate_ma_culturalpolicy.htm.

Rick Faulkner

Rick Faulkner is an artist/director with Chrysalis. He is a founder member of the company and also works as a freelance consultant. He is a trained engineer and undertakes creative, project management and community consultation work for Chrysalis. He has excellent advocacy, visioning and presentation skills and is particularly experienced in successfully developing projects through ideas and funding processes.

Christine Keogh

Christine Keogh is development director with Chrysalis. She has worked professionally in the arts since 1980 and has wide experience of local authority arts work, including arts, regeneration and public art commissioning. She is responsible for strategic development and training and undertakes consultancy work, specialising in artists’ professional development and rural creative industries.

Paul O’ Brien

Paul O’ Brien is a lecturer in aesthetics and cultural theory in the Faculty of Visual Arts at NCAD. His research interests are in the areas of cultural and critical theory and theory of art, art and technology, new media, ecology, and post-modernism. Publications include “Hypertext, Changelings and the Digital Fireside” (chapter in forthcoming book on Ireland and cinema, Wallflower, 2004); “Under the Surface” in Profile: Andrew Folan, Gandon, 2002; “Conspiracies, Computers and Consensus Reality,”Reframing Consciousness, Intellect, 1999; “New Toys for Boys”, The Irish Communications Review, 1997; “Virtual Redemption: The Role of Interactive Art”, Point, Number 1, Winter 1995; “Post-Modernism and Democracy”, Education Arts Research International, 1993; “Art and Technology”, Circa No. 44, Mar/Apr 1989, etc. He has also reviewed many exhibitions of Irish and international artists, and reported on international events in the electronic arts. He recently presented conference papers at the Centre for Advanced Inquiry in the Interactive Arts at the University of Wales College, Newport, and at Glasgow School of Art, and has participated locally in events in the Digital Hub and Media Lab Europe.

Heather Peak

Heather Peak is an artist based in Wales who works collaboratively with Ivan Morrison. Artists Heather and Ivan Morison were born in Desborough and Nottingham, UK, respectively. They have worked together on many projects and have exhibited nationally and internationally. Their work is at once a celebration of and a reflection on simple pleasures and mirrors the passion, process and beauty of their subjects; an astronomer, an ice fisherman, dendrology, floristry, a beekeeper, a pig farmer, Java Sparrows, fungi, science fiction and wildflowers to name a few. Heather & Ivan Morison observe and collect the things they come into contact with, embracing chance encounters and seeking out subjects which are on the edge of daily life. They survey, record and collect to rebuild and re-present the often familiar, investing their observations and discoveries with vigorous fascination. They have a wood in North Wales, where they live and work, which they are developing into an arboretum – a collection of trees gathered from around the world.

Further details contact
Mary Butler, Arts Officer mary.butler[at]kilkennycoco[dot]ie,  056 779 4138
Jean Tormey, Butler Gallery jean[at]butlergallery[dot]com, 056 7761106
MOOT is jointly organised by Mary Butler, Arts Officer Kilkenny County Council and Jean Tormey, Education Curator, Butler Gallery and is supported by the Arts Council of Ireland